


something like cupboard love

by NahaFlowers



Category: Heroes (TV 2006), Heroes (TV)
Genre: (but only if you squint), Bittersweet, College, Fluff, Gen, M/M, Melancholy, Nathan's POV, Other, Pre-Canon, Sibling Incest, Slice of Life, Stream of Consciousness, a fic mostly about the intimacy of kitchens, and Nathan's famous grilled cheeses, ish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:08:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,698
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28342158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NahaFlowers/pseuds/NahaFlowers
Summary: Nathan had puffed up indignantly, with all the confidence of a regular drunk, and told them he would make them all grilled cheeses, and they would eat their words. Peter had beamed up at him, even though Nathan remembered his sandwiches as mediocre at best, too much butter and too much heat. But then, Peter had always been good at finding the beautiful in the average, the perfect in the deeply flawed. How else could the way Peter looked at him be explained,  as though Nathan had hung the moon?Nathan muses on Peter, grilled cheeses and the intimacy of kitchens.
Relationships: Nathan Petrelli/Peter Petrelli
Comments: 1
Kudos: 5





	something like cupboard love

**Author's Note:**

> 'I suppose kitchens are a space for intimacy because I will touch with my hands the things that will go in your mouth; I will taste what you taste; I will work for you, or you will work for me. I will make this for you because I love you, because you need it, because you want it.'
> 
> - **'Cupboard Love' by Ella Risbridger** , from _In The Kitchen: Essays on food and life_

It's 3am on a Friday night and Nathan is rummaging around the kitchen of Peter's student apartment for the ingredients to make grilled cheese.

It's Peter's sophomore year of nursing college and only the second time Nathan’s been in this kitchen - the first time was to see Peter off on his first day. Though Peter insisted he could move in fine on his own and he didn't need Nathan's help (and it wasn't like he was a freshman anymore and he wasn't exactly gonna get homesick anyway), Nathan had seen Peter's smile as he unpacked cutlery and pans and groceries (he had insisted on doing a full shop so Peter wouldn't be surviving on only takeaways and TV dinners during Orientation Week) and known his presence was appreciated and desired.

Naturally, Nathan's tidy stowing of crockery had gone to hell as soon as Peter's roommates moved in and the place became a living breathing example of snug student squalor once more. But he gamely dug for cheese and bread and a frying pan and spatula while Peter's laughter mingled with his friends' in the room next door. No matter how loud the laughter or interwoven the voices, however, Nathan could always pick out Peter's. The relief of cold on a hot summer's day, the sizzle-smell of cheese to a hungry stomach, the landing light left on.

Cheese in the fridge door, pan _on top_ of the cupboard. Bread, for some unknown and frankly disturbing reason, in the sink (luckily it's dry, if not exactly clean). 

"Nathan makes the best grilled cheeses," Peter boasts smugly, _drunkly_ , as they stumble from the last club of the night, heading home hungry, trying to decide how to take the edge off their midnight munchies. Nathan's used to drinking to excess, but not to having fun with it - he's struggling a bit, and he focuses on Peter's smile and his words and leans a bit too far over so that he stumbles into Peter’s arms.

"Woah, there," Peter says with a grin, just as drunk as him, but holding him up. Always holding him up when Nathan can't hold himself. He rights himself as one of Peter's friends (he can't remember their names, he's no good at names, especially when they're Peter's friends, all perfectly nice but all he can think is PeterPeterPeter, his brother filling his nostrils and ears and eyes and senses till the idea of breathing in anyone else is insane. Heidi had wondered aloud why he, a married man and soon-to-be father of two, was going on a night out with his college-aged brother, had asked with just a touch of acid in her tone whether Peter could not make his own friends by now, and Nathan hadn't answered. Not even to defend Peter, because to do so would be revealing himself. His only answer is that he loves his brother, perhaps too much ( _definitely_ too much) and he can't deny himself the opportunity to spend any time at all with him, not when Peter asks him. He's too selfish to say no.), one of Peter's friends says "I think your brother's too wasted to make grilled cheese."

And Nathan had puffed up indignantly, with all the confidence of a regular drunk, and told them he would make them all grilled cheeses, and they would eat their words. Peter had beamed up at him, even though Nathan remembered his sandwiches as mediocre at best, too much butter and too much heat. But then, Peter had always been good at finding the beautiful in the average, the perfect in the deeply flawed. How else could the way Peter looked at him be explained, as though Nathan had hung the moon? 

Cut cheese, assemble on bread, turn on burner. Remember he's forgotten the butter and quickly fish it out of the fridge, offload the cheese and put the first slice of bread butter side down in the now hot pan. If he was _really_ making an effort, he'd fry off some onions, but he'd dug around in the veg compartment and found only one very mouldy onion which he'd quickly discarded. 

"Smells good," says Peter, sloping into the kitchen and leaning against the doorframe. 

Nathan smiles at him, turning briefly away from the assembly line of bread to do so. "Be better with onions," he mutters by way of answer, but Peter just shakes his head. 

"Thanks for doing this," he says. He seems to have sobered up some since getting in, or maybe he was just more with it to begin with. It's not the first time Peter's played weakness to his own advantage when it comes to Nathan. _You just_ love _playing Knight In Shining Armor to Peter's Damsel In Distress_ whispers the cruel voice in his head, but right now it's not so hard to block out. "You didn't have to."

Nathan shrugs, embarrassed but pleased in spite of himself, cheeks pinking from what he can pretend is the alcohol. "You want the first one?" he asks, flipping it onto a plate - golden brown, perfect, a mockery of any sober toastie Nathan's ever tried to make. 

Peter wrinkles his nose. "What, the first pancake? No thanks, I'll give it to Jordan." One of his friends, the drunkest one, Nathan thinks. Or maybe just the hungriest one. Whatever, Peter always takes care of other people before himself. It's why he'll make such a good nurse. 

Nathan flips the next piece of buttered bread into the slightly charred pan, knowing that it'll never match up to the accidental perfection of the first. Knowing Peter will insist on being last, his friends the priority recipients of Nathan's midnight snacks. Just like he knows Peter knows that he'll insist on actually going last, giving Peter the penultimate toastie. He'll resist at first, but Nathan will get him with reason and logic (after all, he's the chef, what's the point in him eating before he's finished?) but really because Peter will always give in to him, if he asks. It's why he tries so hard not to. 

As expected, Peter's friends get the next three grilled cheeses, a couple of them piling in the kitchen to get water and kitchen towel and to thank Nathan profusely. They seem sweet, and Nathan regrets his failure to properly learn their names. He's glad Peter has good friends, although he's never really doubted. Out of the two of them, Peter's always been the natural when it comes to other people. 

Eventually, it's just the two of them left in the kitchen, and only two slices of bread left. Peter looks at the limited bread under Nathan's hands to Nathan's face and back again, and grins. 

"Don't s’pose you've got any more bread?" Nathan asks, even though he'd searched the kitchen high and low for bread and if there was any anywhere else, he'd have found it. 

Peter shakes his head, smile playing on his lips. "Let's share," he says. 

So Nathan butters the bread and lays it on the blackened smoking pan, arranging the cheese (just a bit more than the others) and pressing the slightly stale crust on top. After a minute or two he flips it, squishes it with the spatula, aware of Peter watching him from just behind, a hand's gap between them. Peter breaches it reaching for the bread, made greedy suddenly with hunger, and Nathan bats it away - _too hot, you'll burn yourself._ Instead, he takes the burden, snatching pieces of kitchen towel from the roll and handing one to Peter, grabbing the burning hot grilled cheese straight from the pan and trying not to wince. He blows on it gently and Peter grabs his half from Nathan with the kitchen towel, watching as the strings of cheese pull and stretch until eventually, inevitably, they come apart. They look at each other, grin, and bite into the bread, burning their tongue on molten cheese, identical gasps and grins before diving in for the next bite, withstanding the pain to get to the instant pleasure. 

"Should've taken the first one," Nathan jokes, once the halves have been engulfed and are making their ways down their respective digestive systems. "Hands down the best grilled cheese I've ever made."

"It did look good," Peter acknowledges, dumping his makeshift napkin, crumbs and melted cheese and all, on the counter. He leans back against it, stretches, sighs, satiated. He pulls Nathan closer, so their bodies are touching in a feverish line all the way from their feet to their shoulders. Peter rests his head on Nathan's shoulder, and Nathan looks at him, wondering if Peter's going to say anything else, but he looks like he's about to drop off to sleep.

Nathan reaches for Peter's hand and his brother takes it, holds it with a firmness beyond his years. It's not like it needs to be said anyway.

Nathan yawns.

"Bed, I think," Peter mumbles into his shoulder, and Nathan nods, following Peter out of the kitchen before he remembers the cooker's still on. He turns around in a panic (letting go of Peter's hand) and turns it off at the hob and the mains, removing the pan to a cool hob just for good measure). Peter laughs at him and Nathan accepts it good naturedly but the moment's gone now and Nathan doesn't take Peter's hand again and Peter doesn't offer it. Instead, he simply leads the way out of the kitchen to his room. To sleep (perchance, to dream).

Later, lying neither sleeping nor dreaming by Peter's side, Nathan thinks about the words Peter didn't say. The implied ‘but’, the reason why he didn't regret not taking the first perfect grilled cheese. That’s to say, aside from Peter's selfless generosity and all round embrace of life that seemed to shield him from any regret and send him leaping excitedly into every new thing.

It’s because they got to share it. The dregs of student groceries not quite enough to provide for Peter's friends, Peter, _and_ Nathan.

Half each, and the pleasure of private intimacy in the kitchen.

 _More_ than worth it, always, even with no bread at all. Even if only crumbs had remained.

**Author's Note:**

> I read the essay quoted in the beginning notes yesterday (Christmas Day) and couldn't sleep for thinking about it, so out came this musing, meandering little fic. I love food and cooking and thinking about food and cooking, and I love (and hate how much I love) these two so it only made sense to put them together, at 2am on Christmas night. 
> 
> Talk to me about the intimacy of kitchens!


End file.
